Thanksgiving travel outlook is grim

Travelers who finally make it over the river and through the woods this Thanksgiving holiday may wish they had never left home.

Americans will be flying in record numbers in an airline system plagued by delays and cancellations resulting from bad weather, overcrowded skies, poor labor relations and an air traffic control system struggling to keep up.

Underscoring the prospect of delays and cancellations, the Department of Transportation Friday unveiled a new Web site that allows airline passengers to scan the pattern of flight delays to give them a gambler's chance of learning the odds of making their trip. The site, www.bts.gov, will provide current and historical airport-to-airport, airline-by-airline data on delays and cancellations. Unlike much of the industry data issued by the department, the new Web site will offer travelers daily updated information.

Thanksgiving traditionally has been the biggest travel holiday of the year. Unlike the Christmas season, another busy holiday period, Thanksgiving involves heavy travel every year because it always falls on Thursday and people often turn it into a long weekend.

The Air Transportation Association, which keeps track of such things, predicts that a record 20.46 million people will fly during the holiday period, which began Friday and extends through Nov. 28.

Individual airlines are already warning passengers to get to the airports early and be prepared for delays in finding a parking space, checking luggage and getting through airport security.

Travelers who finally board a plane are not likely to find an empty seat next to them. The industry estimates that planes will be as much as 85 percent full, well above the normal average of slightly more than 70 percent. Those who want to avoid crowds should fly on Thanksgiving day, when planes will be only half full, according to ATA estimates.

New reservations or flight changes are by now probably impossible.

A major problem facing the airlines this holiday season is labor unrest in one of the nation's most heavily unionized industries. Although none of the major airlines faces the threat of a strike during the Thanksgiving holiday, various unions at several major airlines are unhappy over the pace of contract negotiations, a situation that could lead to unofficial work slowdowns throughout the nation.

United Airlines, which faces some of the biggest potential labor problems, this week offered the 50,000 members of the Inernational Association of Machinists union what amounts to a thinly veiled bribe of two weeks pay to keep them happy during the holiday period. The airline is in contract negotiations with the union, which represents mechanics, ramp workers and customer service agents.

But so far it doesn't seem to be working, at least not with the mechanics. United, the nation's largest employee-owned corpration, went to federal court in Chicago Friday seeking an injunction against what it called ''illegal job actions,'' such as work slowdowns, by its maintenance workers. The union has denied the allegations.

By midday, the airline said it had canceled 50 flights, 44 for maintenance operations. The airline normally cancels 20 to 25 flights a day.

During the holidays, the Association of Flight Attendants at United plans to hand out leaflets warning passengers of a campaign of selective disruptions if the airline fails to improve wages under a 10-year contract signed in 1996. This is less of a problem for the airline since the AFA is barred by federal labor law from taking any job actions and both the company and the union expect to work out a wage deal early next year once the machinists reach agreement with the mechanics.

Delta, Northwest and US Airways are also experiencing labor unrest with either pilots or mechanics.